In Rachel Campos-Duffy’s ideal world conservatives would dominate the air waves, championing their cause through pop culture and the mainstream media.
It’s a “battle in the culture before it’s a battle at the ballot box,” Campos-Duffy told a group of 117 high school students at the National High School Leadership Conference Friday morning.
Campos-Duffy, an MTV “Real World” alum and the wife of Rep. Sean Duffy (R-Wis.), knows firsthand the value of appearing on television. She was a member of 1994 cast of the MTV reality show, set in San Francisco, that featured an array of liberal voices. Campos-Duffy was the only conservative and she said she received a lot of positive feedback from viewers who were happy to see someone with their same beliefs.
Pop culture “penetrates our mental space,” she said. Meaning that the people viewers and readers see and hear from every day are the ones that stick with them as they head into the ballot box.
“We share a lot of the blames as conservatives. We like to stay with Fox News, read the Drudge Report. We all have collective online outrage about every time President Obama appears on Jimmy Fallon and does a slow jam, every time he dances on Ellen. We all complain, ‘Oh he’s not serious.’ Then he goes on Between Two Ferns, does March Madness brackets and it’s like, ‘oh he’s not paying attention.’ Then Michelle goes on Nickelodeon. I mean she is practically on there every day. She does the MTV movie awards. She does the Oscars,” Campos-Duffy said.
“All the while that we are protesting and outraged by this, the liberals are committed and absolutely unashamed to occupy this space in pop culture. This space where most of the overworked, debt-ridden, busy, foreclosed-on, broke, and frankly, persuadable Americans are at.”
She challenged attendees to use their talents and passions to help “normalize conservatism.”
She said there is a lot of proof that people aren’t rejecting conservative ideas, but rather rejecting the way they are presented. Because conservatives don’t saturate the airwaves, those who do come through are often made out to be caricatures.
“I think conservatives need to take more risks. We need to go where we haven’t gone before and where we might feel uncomfortable from time to time. We need to meet Americans where they are at,” Campos-Duffy said.
“Elections are lagging indicators of what is already happening in the culture. We as conservatives simply cannot afford to snub pop culture. We can’t afford to sit back and feed it to the left. If we want to win elections we need to win the culture. We have to enter that proverbial lion’s den if we want to have any hope of changing it.”
